The foundation for many innovative sustainability programs around the world is anchored in The Natural Step Framework for Strategic Sustainable Development. Our science-based process has been tested and proven effective by hundreds of forward-thinking organizations over the past two decades.

Our programs focus on two primary intended impact areas we believe are crucial to accelerating the transition to a sustainable society and our unique suite of services translate the fundamentals of sustainability into practical steps for businesses, communities, and other organizations.

If you have ever watched the Monty Python Argument sketch, you may think back on all of the people who appeared to thrive on opposition and arguing for arguments sake. While simply being contrarian can be maddening for most, so can the other extreme where discussions are dominated by overwhelming agreement, or “groupthink”. The most recent IMPACT! Sustainability Champions Training, a collaborative project of The Natural Step Canada and The Co-operators, brought together over 45 individuals to explore opportunities in sustainability and social entrepreneurship. While IMPACT! created some very positive experiences for the attendees, did it balance this positive group dynamic with critical and constructive feedback?

The past year has been one of intense development for The Natural Step Canada. 2014 was the second year of a five year strategic plan focused on shifting our approach from working mostly one organization at a time, to multi-organizational collaborative interventions aimed at catalyzing profound change in larger systems.

The centrepiece of this focus is the Sustainability Transition Lab (STL), which blends our backcasting approach and experience enabling sustainability-driven change within organizations, with best and emerging practice in multi-stakeholder change processes. We’ve spent the last couple of years developing the STL program and methodology, and 2014 was when we really began to put it into practice.

Part 1: How we Measure Business Sustainability

“Wind the clock forward and imagine that we are now in a sustainable economy. What would we be able to say about all companies in that economy? What would be true of the performance of these companies in order for that economy to go on forever?”